Barnum and Bailey Circus

We recently went to the circus. I was browsing KSL and saw that the famous Barnum and Bailey circus was coming to town. I wasn't sure how often they came to SLC so I thought that I should take advantage and bought some really great seats. Noelle was pretty bored through most of it. I don't think she understood the "wow factor." I tried right :) They let the kids see the animals outside before the show. The mommy elephant had just had her baby.

Here is a great link you can copy and paste.
http://listverse.com/2007/08/04/top-10-human-sideshow-freaks/
It is the 10 most famous freak side shows. I guess it is sort of sad. The circus has been around for 150 years so these are really old. My favorite is the "Half Lady" in her victorian corset.

Halloween

Here are some pics of Nells trick or treating. It was raining pretty bad that night but she didn't let it ruin her day. I originally had bought her a really cute kid friendly clown costume but Pete didn't think it was "appropriate" Weird! So I went to walmart and got her a boring doctor custume instead.

preschool pics

Noelle's first day of head start was today. She was very excited. Her classroom is at U of U housing and consists mostly of the college students children. They qualify through poverty income. Most kids are white and english speaking in contrast to the other locations which are predominantly hispanic spanish speaking so hopefully it will be easier for her to relate and understand the other kids. Her teacher is a funny character. He is a vegan, mohawk, tattooed hippy type. Not your stereotypical preschool teacher. He is very very good with the kids. Noelle loves him. She says "I love my new teacher so so much he is a boy." She loves the fact that he is a guy and not a girl like her other teachers have been. The class is 4 days a week 3.5 hours a day. Is is pretty low budget but a sweet little class. They feed the kids lunch every day so that is nice. Here are some videos of Nell's special day.

Jim Gaffigan talks about Cake

I just got done working on my thesis and needed a bit of humor for some stress relief. This is a hilarious bit from Jim Gaffigan on cake. I was talking about his Hot Pocket skit with one of my coworkers and he told me about this little jewel. It's just good, clean humor.

antique table

I thought I would get some fun antique furniture to go with my old house. I found this intricately carved wooden table on KSL. It needed some love so I found some old polyurethane varnish in my basement and put a coat on today. It looks great. I don't know if I should put it in the kitchen or find a spot in the family room. I also got an old vintage emerald green vase at the DI last week. I might put it on the table and fill it with some hand made paper flowers I found on etsy.

Floors finally finished!

It has been a long and slow week to make sure this floor finally got done. The guy I ended up hiring turned out to be really flaky and wouldn't show up until 5:00 in the afternoon most days. Than he would work a couple of hours and leave. Anyway we had to stay three extra nights in the hotel than was originally planned because of this. It is nice to not have lenoleum anymore. I bought some paint yesterday. I am going to paint the kitchen when Nells starts preschool in a month. White on the crown molding and then yellow on the walls. I am having a hard time figuring out what color yellow to put on because it has to go along with my olive colored walls in the family room. Maybe a yellow with a hind of green. Tricky. Anyone have any suggestions?

Lost Predictions

Ok. So, the Series Finale of Lost is coming soon. I was just talking to one of my best friends from high school who is also a huge Lost fan like myself. We discussed possible theories and then made some predictions for this last episode. If you haven't watched Lost, consider this your spoiler alert for the following paragraphs....

ONE MORE TIME FOR SAFETY.....***SPOILER ALERT***

Prediction #1: Jack dies, and someone else takes over as protector of the island. I thought it was pretty predictable to see Jack become the protector of the island, so I'm going to predict that since this predictable action took place in such an unconventional show that they will surprise us.

Prediction #2: The "Sideways World" will become the truer reality. One of the worlds has to be more real, right? I think they do away with the island because....

Prediction #3: The Island will be terminated/blown up/obliterated somehow. Desmond or Smokey will be the cause of this I'm guessing.

Regan's addition:
The characters will be given a choice between 1 of the 2 worlds. They can either choose as their reality the island existence or the "Sideways World".

Also, what in the world happened to Lapidus? I haven't figured that one out yet. I guess we'll find out soon. Anyways, here's to one of the greatest shows of all time ending....so sad and yet so appropriate. :(((

Noelle's 4th Birthday

We had Noelle's birthday last month. We were going to go to Chucky Cheese but Pete heard about this great little place called Jungle Gyms. Utah has tons of places for children obviously because there are tons of families here in SLC. It was sort of like an indoor miniature carnival. They had about 8 different rides and a huge play ground area. We got her a "Baby Alive Feel Better Soon" doll and a half dozens books that I picked out from the Deseret Industries. I also found a Cabbage Patch doll from the 80s. She has a Cabbage Patch movie so I thought she'd appreciate it. She actually ended up loving her books more than her new doll and barbie dream house. She reads them all day long. Here are some pics of her birthday at Jungle Gyms.

New Tulips

Our beautiful tulips have come in. They do really well in Utah despite the little rainfall and super hot summers. Noelle and I have began to prepare a nursery for the garden this Summer. We have tons of newly sprouted seedlings growing in our "do it yourself" greenhouse indoors. We are growing corn, asparagus, squash, sunflowers, poppies, pumpkins, lavender, carrots, green beans, wildflowers, daisies, and a few more. Hopefully they don't all die. Noelle is obsessed with planting and getting into trouble. She wants to help so bad but doesn't.

Sorry this is very late.

I know that Christmas is well over but I just ran across a great picture of Noelle and Santa that I had forgotten to add in December. At the Civic Center in Sandy they have this great Christmas display of trees and gingerbread houses. We waited in line forever for santa. Noelle was very excited. I wasn't sure if she would be willing to sit on his lap when the time came. She ended up not being scared at all. She was really brave and very happy but a little embarrased. Especially since everyone was looking at her. It was well worth the wait.

Jazz Game

Pete got great seats to the Jazz game from work. His favorite basketball team "Spurs" were playing the jazz. Noelle did pretty good. She doesn't quite last the 3 hours though. She loves the Jazz Bear. Actually they just added a baby Jazz Bear to the big Jazz mascott. Noelle loved the baby bear.

Birthday Presents Galore

Nellies birthday is fast approaching. Grandpa Winstead bought her the toy of all toys. Barbie Deluxe Townhouse fully furnished. This is an elaborate $200 dollar toy. Here are some pics. She loves it!

Oscar Picks

Alright, tonight is the Super Bowl of movies and of course I have an opinion of where this should go. Did you expect any less? Here are the picks:

Best Picture: The Hurt Locker
Best Director: Kathryn Bigelow, The Hurt Locker
Best Actor: Jeff Bridges, Crazy Heart
Best Actress: Sandra Bullock, Blind Side
Best Supporting Actor: Christoph Waltz, Inglorious
Best Supporting Actress: Monique, Precious
Best Original Screenplay: Inglorious
Best Adapted Screenplay: Up in the Air
Best Cinematography: Haven't decided between Avatar and White Ribbon
Best Editing: The Hurt Locker
Best Animated Feature: Up of course. Just fill in this answer with the newest Pixar movie going forward since they've decided to release one a year
Best Foreign Language Film: White Ribbon
Then just give all the tech awards to Avatar.

Enjoy the show.